Free tutorials & courses

The bar: each link below has been used by a real non-technical person who came out the other end able to do the thing. No “introduction to programming” rabbit holes — just the smallest viable path.

The five non-negotiables

For each skill, one short primary resource and one for when you want to go deeper.

Git, just enough

• Primary — The Missing Semester · Version Control — MIT’s “things they don’t teach you” lecture, ~1hr.
• Practice — Learn Git Branching — interactive sandbox, no install needed.
• Reference — Oh Sh*t, Git!?! — recovery cheatsheet for when things go wrong.

Environment variables in production

• Primary — The Twelve-Factor App · Config — 5 minutes; this is the canonical mental model.
• Hands-on — Cloudflare Pages env vars docs — concrete walkthrough you can do in 10 minutes.

Deploy from git

• Cloudflare Pages quickstart — Connect a Git repository — pushes deploy automatically.
• Vercel quickstart — Deploy your first site — slicker UI, generous free tier.

Reading logs

• Primary — your hosting provider’s “Logs” tab + their docs (Cloudflare, Vercel, Railway all have decent ones).
• Mental model — Logs vs metrics vs traces — read once, internalise the difference.

Restoring a backup

• Primary — your DB provider’s restore docs. Do this once on a non-prod copy before you need it.
• Mental model — The 3-2-1 backup rule — 3 copies, 2 media, 1 offsite. Old but holds up.

Claude Code & AI development

• Claude Code docs — Anthropic’s official walkthrough. Start with “Quickstart” and “Common workflows.”
• Claude API docs — when you’re moving from Code/Chat to building your own integrations.
• Anthropic Cookbook — copy-paste examples for tool use, prompt caching, RAG, agents.
• Claude Code patterns reference — official guide to skills, agents, and slash commands.
• MCP server quickstart — when you want Claude to talk to a tool that doesn’t have an MCP yet.

Founder fundamentals (free, high-signal)

• Stripe Atlas Guides — incorporation, early team, fundraising. Best on the internet, no email gate.
• Y Combinator’s “Startup School” — videos + essays on building a company, hiring, raising.
• Paul Graham’s essays — required reading on founder psychology and decision-making.
• First Round Review — long-form interviews with operators. Use the search; the back catalog is the value.
• Lenny’s free posts — product/growth tactics; the free posts are enough to start.

Hiring & evaluation

• Triplebyte’s interview-as-engineer-vs-not framework — how to read engineering CVs without being one yourself.
• Will Larson · An Elegant Puzzle — the chapters on hiring and onboarding are gold for first-time engineering managers (which you’ll be, briefly).

Compliance & security

• OWASP Top 10 — the ten most common web vulnerabilities, plain English.
• GDPR for engineers — practical, not legalese.
• Have I Been Pwned · For developers — check whether your users’ passwords are already compromised.

”Going deeper” rabbit holes (when you’re ready)

• Full Stack Open · University of Helsinki — free, exhaustive, modern stack. Months of work.
• The Odin Project — full-stack curriculum aimed at career-switchers. Very gentle ramp.
• **Frontend Masters · Free workshops **— specific deep dives. Their free tier is small but worth checking before paying.

A note: don’t start here unless you’re sure you want to. The whole thesis of this course is that you probably don’t need to. Bookmark, then come back if and only if a real bottleneck appears.